


Juvie

by glittergrenade



Category: Young Avengers
Genre: Angst, Gen, Introspection, Juvie, Prison, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture, but not really, i mean just wishing for death, thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-04
Updated: 2015-10-04
Packaged: 2018-04-23 18:26:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4887133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glittergrenade/pseuds/glittergrenade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life in juvie sucked for Tommy until the Young Avengers came to his rescue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Juvie

**Author's Note:**

> TOMMY NEEDS LOVE I mean it literally makes me so sad when I think about how he was in juvie, when I think about juvie and Tommy being in it makes me sad cuz he deserves better and he needs hugs, and especially the fact that they were trying to turn him into a weapon and yeah, generally I think Tommy is a way too unexplored character but I love him and so yeah... uh... so yeah story with barely any dialogue, I didn't know I could do that.

He can't move. Tommy hates it when he can't move. The seconds roll by slowly, painfully, each feeling like years to him. So long and he's still alive. He wants to die. And not just from boredom… he would give anything to get out of this place, but if he doesn't, he'd rather die than go on in here while they do this to him. But they won't let him. They won't let him die. Why can't they just let him die?

They're taunting him. One of them, anyway. The big man, blurred in his line of vision. Something along the lines of, _Not so clever when you can't run away from us, are you, little jerk?_ The female scientist reprimands him for it. Tommy wishes he could make a sassy remark, punch the guy in the face, but no, the drugs are too heavy on his body to even say a clear word. The big man points out to the woman that Tommy deserves the taunts, and the desire to be smartass vanishes. He's right. Tommy is no good. He never liked school, he figures he's like one of those kids you hear about who comes to school with a gun and goes on a murdering spree… but he never meant to vaporize his the place. At least, it wasn't premeditated, and that's the same thing, right?

Sometimes, he imagines what it would be like to be a superhero — how thrilling and good it would feel to blow up the bad guys and save the pretty girls. But he isn't fooling himself; it's clear to him he's on the opposite path. And he doesn't want to be a supervillain, but it seems like his only choice anymore. Either the government succeeds in turning him into a weapon, or the impossible happens: he breaks out and vents his pain in another murdering spree. He's too screwed up to do anything otherwise. Too screwed up. But he doesn't care. He just wants _out_ of this place. One way or another.

The scientists are still talking. Tommy doesn't stir as the needles go into his skin, he blinks dazedly as they stitch up the incision they made in his stomach. From their dialogue, they're not actually doing anything to him. Just tests, trying to see what makes him tick. He's not sure what they expect to find; he's a mutant, so he's presumably just got the genes of your average 16-year-old criminal, plus the X-gene, right? But he guesses there must be something unique about each mutant's X-gene, since powers have so much variation. Tommy is no rocket scientist… or biologist… or whatever. He supposes the scientists must be getting somewhere with this since they keep at what they're doing. How long has he been here? He can't remember. Months by now. Months of being prodded and probed and operated on and… tortured. Is this even legal? He's a juvenile delinquent, he's not a lab rat. He's a person. He has rights. Yeah, as if. Convicts don't have rights.

The female scientist sounds impatient, but Tommy is familiar enough with this one to tell that she's just nervous, so he instantly guesses that she has a thing for her male companion. _We're on a tight schedule, and I have things to do_ , Tommy thinks she says. _Just got a bit more testing, samples, and when the drugs wear off, give the boy ten minutes in the Course to check his time and reflexes. Then lockdown in his cell for the night. I'm actually going out after work, with friends… you're welcome if you'd like to join us…_

Tommy isn't listening anymore. He can't muster up the will to focus on the shy flirting of his tormentors. A shudder runs through his heart as he overhears one phrase. _The Course_. Not that. The Course is an obstacle course, where Tommy gets observed like a rat in a maze. Except, with rats, it's usually more ethical. Rats don't get tasered when they don't run fast enough. Real lab rats are treated more kindly than he ever is. Because they're innocent animals, he assumes. Tommy is a criminal, so the scientists can't care less about his happiness and fair treatment.

He doesn't actually know which he hates worse, the Lab or the Course. At least when they operate on him here in the Lab, he's drugged up, so it barely hurts when they make incisions. In the Course, there's wide space, with lots of room to run, which is pretty neat, since none of the other inmates get that luxury, not even out in the jail yard. There are also many traps, specially engineered to react at super speeds, but he outspeeds them every time. That is, when he's paying good enough attention. He has attention deficit problems, apparently. He thinks that should give him a pass sometimes. But there are a million ways to displease the scientists in the Course, a million ways to get himself tasered. That's another difference between him and an actual rat. The rats he hears about get rewarded with food for completing their tasks. He gets punished with pain when he doesn't do well enough compared to their expectations. As if _their_ sorry asses would last a single minute in the Course.

Tommy realizes he's being moved now. He's brought to a familiar room, the size of an elevator. He doesn't know what the walls are made of, but it must be the same as in his cell, because something it gives off keeps him from using his powers, making him feel drained. They lie him out on the floor of this room, and install the inhibitor collar around his neck. He's used to this routine. They set the post-operation juice box and protein bar next to him, and leave.

This wasn't the way they it did when they first started these tests. They used to put the inhibitor collar on him and let him come out of the drugs in the lab, but he always tried to escape. They always had to turn the collar to the highest pain setting, and by that point he would never be in any testing condition for the Course. It was very counterintuitive. So now they leave Tommy in a power-dampening room so they don't have to torture him before watching him run. Their problem is solved.

Tommy has a very quick metabolism, so it isn't long at all till the drugs wear off. In fact the scientists have to pump the drugs intravenously the entire time while they operate on him, to be sure that he can't struggle. It's sometimes frustrating, how fast drugs burn through his system. Before he got locked up, Tommy used to experiment with hard drugs, because it's just what you do when you're an unloved rebellious teen who doesn't fit in anywhere. But he never even fit in with the junkies. Their highs lasted so much longer than his, and after exhausting every drug he could get his hands on — and that was all of them — he decided that drugs bore him. But that's okay. He doesn't mind. That's what he tells himself, anyway. He doesn't have to be like anybody else.

He doesn't have to be the weapon these scientists want him to be.

He squeezes the juice down his throat without bothering to stick the straw in. Strawberry mango. He likes strawberry mango. He blows through the straw boredly, making slight bends in hopes to change the pitch and play a quick tune. He fails at that epically, and is given a painful _zap_ for his effort. "I wasn't done!" he shouts, and curses under his breath, unwrapping the protein bar. He gobbles it down. Presently the doors open. That means the scientists think his vitals are good. Pain starts up again, herding him out.

He runs out, into the Course, and breathes deeply as the wind hits his face, breezing through his soft white hair. He loves running, though he hates the fact that right now he's doing it for the benefit of his tormentors. He races around the target-marked poles till they burst into dust particles, and narrowly avoids a blue trap, only to catch his foot on a tripwire. Dammit! Pain sears through him from the inhibitor collar. Tommy's first instinct is to clutch at his neck, but he knows better than that, and at the moment he's not a sucker for punishment. Not today.

Tommy hates the inhibitor collar. When he's in the Course, it remains around his neck at all times. It's what zaps him when he performs less than perfect, or if he makes the slightest move resembling an attempt to escape. It always hurts, though, the baseline level, prodding him on like a cow in a herd. The first time he tried to yank it off, it zapped him so badly he passed out from pain. He tries again anyway, every now and then, just to let his captors know he hasn't resigned himself to their designs. Tommy is obstinate that way. But today isn't one of those days. He just wants this over with.

It isn't half bad this time. It's short, anyways. Ten minutes. They did say, after all, that today's run is just a check up. It's not long before he's brought out, and taken to his cell with his dinner, if it's over in the cafeteria, which it probably is. The inhibitor collar is taken off, but he's injected again so he can't bolt in the split second between then and the moment he's shoved in the cell. He looks vacantly at his dinner. It's another juice box — this one fruit punch — and a protein shake — he hates those — and a box-shaped hunk of beef — that he knows tastes like cardboard — and a cheese and crackers packet. So he did miss dinner in the cafeteria. Sucks. He wouldn't want it all the time, but he could use a bit of company, even if only from rowdy inmates. Somebody who treats him like a person.

He lies in his cell, as the shot wears off quickly. He can't use his powers in here, and he hates that. Still, this is actually his favorite part of the day, he thinks, when he's brought back to his cell and put on the nightly lockdown. It isn't even a terrible cell; it's better than he'd heard about from his "friends" who've been to juvie in the past. His cot could be way more comfortable, sure, and the toilet bowl could use a bit more privacy, and yeah, the walls could do with less power-dampeners, or at least a TV. His unit only has one TV, and he's practically always on lockdown so he hardly gets to watch it. The one real improvement is that he has his cell all to himself, thanks to his superpowers, so he doesn't have to worry about other kids bothering him or stealing things or picking fights during lockdown. Though sometimes he wishes for a fight, in this place.

Minus the testing, the abuse is about the same as he expected; but at least he doesn't have to worry about much extra coming from other inmates. As if they could touch him. He in particular is on lockdown more than everybody else, it seems like. It's lonely. He still has his weekly group shower with the other kids in his unit, watched by guards, though he's the only one who wears an inhibitor collar when it happens.

It's boring in here, he tells himself. But that isn't completely true. He's too miserable to be bored. To miserable and too angry.

He prefers the anger. Every night, when Tommy is brought back here, all he wants to do is curl up on his cot and cry. But he knows there are hidden cameras, he knows they must be watching him, so he doesn't. He holds it all in till he feels like he's going to burst, and then some. He hasn't let himself cry once in all the time since he got to juvie. He's not going to give them the satisfaction of knowing that he's broken. Knowing that they've won.

So he's grateful for the anger. If it weren't for that, he doesn't know how he would bear this. He lies on his hard cot, imagining all the painful things he wants to do to the people who work here. The people who make his life hell. But he doesn't really have hope. He knows they'll never let him out of their own volition — after all, he was convicted of mass murder, and given a life sentence. This will continue until he's their perfect weapon. Then presumably they'll deploy him in the field, in wars and stuff. Best he can hope for is death on the battlefield. Though he highly doubts they'd grant him a posthumous Medal of Honor.

He stares at his food, but he doesn't feel like eating. His eyes settle on his Algebra 2 book, but he doesn't feel like doing homework. For some reason erasers aren't allowed in here, anyway, and he makes too many mistakes. Ugh. Tomorrow is a school day. He hates "school" here, even worse than the one he vaporized. There used to be one very cool girl in his unit and in his class — Lisa — but she was released a few weeks back. Good for her. Now there's _nothing_ good for Tommy. Each unit shares a classroom session: the teacher hates the kids' guts, and for Tommy, his inhibitor collar remains on during class, no matter how much they need to zap him. They don't worry about torturing his body when they're only testing his brain, and all the other inmates know he's not like them. That he's a powerful mutant. He could be the next Magneto — hell, he's already got the white hair.

Tommy sighs. He decides to just try to go to sleep. Maybe things will look better in the morning. Ha. As if things are ever better in the morning. It doesn't take him long to drift off, either way.

A sound wakes him in the middle of the night. He starts. At first he thinks it's a guard, just doing a nightly hallway patrol, but it doesn't sound like the weighted rhythmic footsteps he's accustomed to hearing. He sits up slowly. It sounds like someone fiddling with something at his door. It sounds like whispers. It sounds like sparks. And then suddenly, he feels alive again.

Whatever just happened, the power dampeners are gone. In other words, it just destroyed the only thing that was keeping him locked in here. He gets up instantly and runs at the door, flicking his finger at super speed to destabilize its atoms. _Boom!_ He's out! Alarms go off instantly, loud and searing and beautiful. He blinks through the smoke, his heart pounding at a thousand miles an hour. He feels bewildered, but so happy. This is too good to… can it really be true? He's not dreaming, is he? He closes his eyes for a moment. Those alarm sirens… they're music to his ears. The theme song of Liberty. He _is_ free.

There's yelping coughs in the smoke, and he makes out three figures, struggling to get back on their feet. His saviors, presumably.

"Cassie!"

"I'm okay. How's Billy?"

"I'll be fine. Eventually."

Three… teenagers, are they? Not inmates, though. They look strange. Not that he cares how they look; it's strange in a cool way. Like superheroes. Though more likely supervillains… also cool! He wishes he could see them better right now, but it's dark and it's smoky and none of the kids seem in the best of health for him vaporizing the door.

"Billy, you're bleeding."

"That explains why it _hurts_."

"Vision, what did you _do_?"

Tommy squints, trying to get a better look at these people. "He set me _free_." He keeps his voice level, steady. In control. Whatever reason they did this for, he knows he has to seem tough. Show no weakness. It's the first lesson you learn in juvie; though maybe he had that one easy. After all, he was forced to learn that same rule very early on in life.

"Thomas?"

So they did do it on purpose. They know who he is, but he sure doesn't know them. Though they are starting to seem familiar, as if maybe he's seen them on television. They _must_ be superhumans. Whichever side they're on, he knows he owes them, and he's going to live up to that if he makes it out of here in one piece. Maybe then… and he knows it's too much to hope for, but he wishes for it anyway… maybe then he will find some place to _belong_.

"Tommy," he corrects evenly. He doesn't like his formal name. It reminds him of authority figures who make his life miserable. The people who he's finally going to _punish_ , now that he's set free. "Who the hell are you?"


End file.
